hi there,
my mum was diagnosed with dementia at the end of 2019 and since then the chaos that has ensued is totally exhausting. The worst thing is that my dad has become so sad that not only am i trying to keep my mum stimulated, I'm also trying to prevent my dad from sinking into a deep dark hole of despair. They have been together since they were both 17 year olds like a pair of old hiking boots........hiking through life together. I am struggling to know how to help them and have some sort of existence myself. The biggest problem is that my mum doesn't know that she has dementia because owing to her personality my father and I decided that she probably wouldn't cope very well knowing. However we now have a moral dilemma in that she has begun to say that she thinks that there is something wrong with her mind and that she remembers being more capable in the past. We are going to have a family meeting but at the end of the day I feel that the decision lies with me and my father as we are her only carers. The other huge problem is that both my parents have been very insular all their lives and so have no friends and have a fear of any outsiders bar the family. Subsequently the situation is complicated by the fact that the only person they trust is me and I am also the only person who they will allow to help them. I feel sometimes like my shoulders are not wide enough for the mammoth task ahead of me. This is the loneliest place on earth and certainly the saddest. To be looking at the person who cared for me all her life now in such a desperate state is the most painful feeling I've ever experienced. Sadly she had breast cancer at the beginning of 2019 and had to have a mastectomy and then had the diagnosis of dementia. I kind of wished she had been taken by the cancer rather than this slow wicked disease. Poor mum and poor dad.
my mum was diagnosed with dementia at the end of 2019 and since then the chaos that has ensued is totally exhausting. The worst thing is that my dad has become so sad that not only am i trying to keep my mum stimulated, I'm also trying to prevent my dad from sinking into a deep dark hole of despair. They have been together since they were both 17 year olds like a pair of old hiking boots........hiking through life together. I am struggling to know how to help them and have some sort of existence myself. The biggest problem is that my mum doesn't know that she has dementia because owing to her personality my father and I decided that she probably wouldn't cope very well knowing. However we now have a moral dilemma in that she has begun to say that she thinks that there is something wrong with her mind and that she remembers being more capable in the past. We are going to have a family meeting but at the end of the day I feel that the decision lies with me and my father as we are her only carers. The other huge problem is that both my parents have been very insular all their lives and so have no friends and have a fear of any outsiders bar the family. Subsequently the situation is complicated by the fact that the only person they trust is me and I am also the only person who they will allow to help them. I feel sometimes like my shoulders are not wide enough for the mammoth task ahead of me. This is the loneliest place on earth and certainly the saddest. To be looking at the person who cared for me all her life now in such a desperate state is the most painful feeling I've ever experienced. Sadly she had breast cancer at the beginning of 2019 and had to have a mastectomy and then had the diagnosis of dementia. I kind of wished she had been taken by the cancer rather than this slow wicked disease. Poor mum and poor dad.